March 2017 MMA News Archive

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Michael Chiesa is set for his return after more than a year away from the Octagon.
The top lightweight will take on Kevin Lee in the main event of UFC Fight Night 112 on June 25 in Oklahoma City, MMA Fighting confirmed with UFC officials Thursday. Adam Hill of the Las Vegas Review-Journal was the first to report the news.

AUSTIN, TX -- March 27, 2017 -- Today, FloSports, the innovator in live digital sports and original content, announced the official main card for Submission Underground 4 featuring Dillon Danis and Jake Shields as the headline fighters for the May 14 live event in Portland, Ore. The submission-only grappling competition, co-presented by FloSports and Chael Sonnen, will be live streamed to an international audience exclusively on FloGrappling.com starting at 3:00 p.m. PST.

The 13-bout lineup up is set for next month’s “UFC on FOX 24: Johnson vs. Reis” event in Missouri.
UFC on FOX 24 takes place April 15 at Sprint Center in Kansas City, Mo. The main card airs on FOX following prelims on FOX and UFC Fight Pass. UFC on FOX 24 will be the promotion’s first trip to Kansas City, and its first trip to the state of Missouri.

UFC flyweight Matheus Nicolau has been suspended by USADA.
The Brazilian fighter has received a one-year suspension by the UFC’s anti-doping partner after testing positive for anastrozole, a prohibited substance in the category of Hormone and Metabolic Modulators that is at all times prohibited by the UFC Anti-Doping Policy. The news was announced by USADA on Wednesday, per a press release.

A lightweight bout pitting Clay Guida and Erik Koch is the latest addition to UFC Fight Night 112. The news was reported on Wednesday by UFC Tonight.
Guida will be leaving the featherweight division where he put together a record of 3-4 and will be making a move back up to the 155-pound weight class in hopes to snap a two-fight skid. The Team Alpha Male fighter last fought this past June at UFC 199 where he suffered a knockout loss to Brian Ortega. Guida, 35, is 32-17 as a professional fighter and 12-11 in the UFC.

A trilogy fight is in the works for UFC 213.
A matchup between former UFC heavyweight champion Fabricio Werdum and former Strikeforce champ Alistair Overeem is in the works for the July 8 event at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. MMAFighting.com confirmed an initial report Wednesday by FloCombat.
Overeem (42-15, 1 NC) enters the proposed bout the winner of five out of his past six fights, four of them via knockout. His only loss in that stretch was a first-round loss to current UFC heavyweight champion Stipe Miocic at UFC 203.

RIZIN Fighting Federation has announced that World Grand Prix 2016 runner-up Amir Aliakbari will return in April to face Geronimo Dos Santos in an open weight contest at a RIZIN event in Yokohama.
Aliakbari started off his career with 5 straight wins with three knockout finishes. 2016 was a very good year for the Iranian until the last day at the World Grand Prix Finals when he faced the legend Mirko “Cro Cop”. The Croatian defended well against the power of Aliakbari and pummelled him with two left hooks that floored his opponent.

Ten icons of the sport to showdown including Kenny Florian, Wellington “Megaton” Dias and Marcio Cruz
Matches span over Bantamweight, Lightweight, Welterweight, Middleweight and Heavyweight divisions
The 9th championship takes place from 10th-23rd April at IPIC Arena, Zayed Sports City, Abu Dhabi
Just over 2 weeks left to register for World Professional Championship runs which 18th-22nd April 2017
Ten icons of the sport to showdown including Kenny Florian, Wellington “Megaton” Dias and Marcio Cruz
Matches span over Bantamweight, Lightweight, Welterweight, Middleweight and Heavyweight divisions
The 9th championship takes place from 10th-23rd April at IPIC Arena, Zayed Sports City, Abu Dhabi
Just over 2 weeks left to register for World Professional Championship runs which 18th-22nd April 2017
The ninth annual Abu Dhabi World Jiu-Jitsu Championships, held under the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces, welcomes legends of the sport for the second year running, in what is set to be an epic showdown on Saturday 22nd April 2017.
Ten Jiu-Jitsu icons, both current and retired, will battle it out on the mat for five gold belts in the ultimate clash of talent.
The UAE Jiu-Jitsu Federation is proud to announce fights between Bantamweight legends Wellington “Megaton” Dias (USA) and Helio “Soneca” Moreira (Brazil); Lightweight legends Alexandre “Soca” Freitas and Baret Yoshida (HAW); Welterweight legends Kenny Florian (USA) and Vitor “Shaolin” Ribeiro; Middleweight legends Amaury Bitetti (BRA) and Roberto “Spider” Traven (USA); and Heavyweight legends Marcio “Pe de Pano” Cruz (BRA) and Gabriel “Napao” Gonzaga (BRA).
Fighting in the brand-new Bantamweight division of the Abu Dhabi World Jiu-Jitsu Championship is Wellington “Megaton” Dias from the USA, who has been a star of the sport for over two decades. Megaton, known for his takedown slams that are so loud they resemble a megaton bomb, is the only Jiu-Jitsu fighter to have competed in all first 16 editions of the World BJJ Championships as a black belt (from 1996 until 2011), having reached the podium on 4 occasions.

New Zealand’s Dan Hooker will step up to the lightweight division and take on British veteran Ross Pearson at UFC Fight Night 110 in Auckland. The Kiwi announced the matchup on New Zealand radio earlier today.

Ohio native Chris Curtis (14-5) is set to defend his CES MMA welterweight title this Friday, as the “Action Man” will face challenger Wilfredo Santiago Jr. (5-2) in the main event at CES MMA 42. The event goes down in Lincoln, Rhode Island and airs live on AXS TV.
Curtis, who has spent time in California training with Team Quest in preparation for the fight, won the title with a first round submission via strikes over Gil de Freitas at CES MMA 32 last January. He was then slated to defend the title against UFC veteran Nah-Shon Burrell at CES MMA 34 last April, but Burrell missed weight and the bout turned into a non-title fight. Burrell was awarded a controversial split decision win, but Curtis kept his belt in the non-title fight.

Brave 4: Unstopabble will go down in history as the event that crowned the first ever Brave Combat Federation champion, with a Featherweight title fight between Masio Fullen and Elias Boudegzdame. In a different page, the event will also be historical for the promotion, with a record-breaking number of TV broadcasters around the world.
In total, 48 different countries worldwide will broadcast Brave 4 next Friday, March 31st. The list of broadcast partners includes some of the major networks around the world, like: OSN Sports (MENA), ABS CBN (Southeast Asia), Myx TV (USA), Claro TV (Latin America), and Combate (Brazil).
The remaining countries, not covered by the television deals, will have access to the fights through the online streaming at Brave’s official website www.bravefights.com.

Recently, UFC middleweight champion Michael Bisping made headlines when he revealed that he would take away Georges St-Pierre’s middleweight title fight if the former welterweight kingpin wasn’t prepared for his Octagon return by July

The UFC’s return to Rio de Janeiro in June continues to build with the addition of a middleweight bout.
According to a report from Brazilian news outlet Combate, Brazil’s Paulo Borrachinha (9-0 MMA, 1-0 UFC) will take on Oluwale Bamgbose (6-2 MMA, 1-2 UFC) at UFC 212. UFC officials have not yet formally announced the booking.

World Series of Fighting could soon be on the verge of losing its lightweight champion.
Justin Gaethje (17-0), considered one of the best and most exciting young fighters in MMA, is officially a free agent, according to multiple sources.
MMA Fighting reported in November that Gaethje was planning on testing the free-agent market in early 2017, and on Monday, FOXSports.com reported he was now officially free to field offers. Sources told MMA Figthing that he was given clearance to do so on Friday. WSOF currently has the right to match any offer Gaethje receives.

The UFC’s return to Singapore will include fights involving Andrei Arlovski and Takanori Gomi.
The UFC kicked off Tuesday with a slew of fight announcements for its Saturday, June 17th event in Singapore. Two of the bigger names confirmed for the event are former UFC heavyweight champion Andrei Arlovski and former PRIDE lightweight champion Takanori Gomi. Arlovski will be facing Poland’s Marcin Tybura, while Gomi will take on Jon Tuck.
Arlovski (25-14, 1 NC) has lost four straight bouts, including a 92-second thrashing vs. Francis Ngannou at UFC on FOX 23 in Denver. His other defeats during this run have come against Josh Barnett (who became the first man to submit Arlovski), Alistair Overeem, and current champion Stipe Miocic. The last time Arlovski won a fight was by unanimous decision vs. Frank Mir at UFC 191, which gave him an unlikely six-fight winning streak. Tybura (15-2) had a disappointing UFC debut, losing to Timothy Johnson by decision last May in Zagreb, Croatia. Since then, Tybura has scored back-to-back stoppage wins, knocking out Viktor Pesta with a head kick in August, then TKOing Luiz Henrique at UFC 209.

For the first few minutes, Wanderlei Silva’s presence was more heard than felt at today’s news conference for “Bellator: NYC.”
A hot mic picked up every nuance of Silva’s heavy breathing before he chimed in to rebut rival Chael Sonnen, who blasted the Brazilian MMA star for no-showing the event’s first promotional opportunity for the June 24 pay-per-view event at Madison Square Garden in New York City.

Dillon Danis has yet to have his first professional mixed martial arts fight. But the jiu-jitsu standout is doing his best to make sure the Bellator roster knows exactly who he is.
Danis signed a contract with Bellator MMA just two weeks ago, and he’s wasted little time placing the target squarely on his own back.

Legacy Fighting Alliance (LFA) CEO Ed Soares announced earlier this month that LFA will host three consecutive weeks of LFA events in April. The third of the three will be LFA 10, which will be the second LFA event to take place in the state of Colorado. It will also be the tenth LFA event to take place after the strategic merger between leading developmental organizations Resurrection Fighting Alliance (RFA) and Legacy Fighting Championship (Legacy FC).
The main event of LFA 10 will feature the long-awaited showdown between two top middleweights who were originally slated to tangle at LFA 5. The main event of LFA 10 will see undefeated blue-chip prospect Ian Heinisch finally lock horns with Brazilian powerhouse Lucas Rota. LFA 10 – Heinisch vs. Rota takes place Friday, April 21st at the Massari Arena in Pueblo, Colorado. The entire main card will be televised live and nationwide on AXS TV at 9 p.m. ET / 6 p.m. PT.